Bully – level 2

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Bully – level 2

The messages won't stop. Who is sending them? And what can Kay do?

Instructions

Do the preparation exercise first and then read the article. If you find it too easy, try the next level. If it's too difficult, try the lower level. After reading, do the exercises to check your understanding.

Preparation

Kay got another message as she was leaving for school.

unknown number: You’re so ugly.

She put her phone back in her pocket as she walked towards the bus stop. There were more messages every day now and she felt really depressed. Who was it? Why were they doing this to her? Was it more than one person? The names kept changing. The phone beeped.

candybear76: freak!

She was always friendly with everyone and she didn’t know why anyone would do this to her. Now her friends were avoiding her, apart from Becky. She was Kay’s oldest friend. The phone beeped again. It was a comment on her Facebook profile picture.

princesspusheen: No one wants to look at photos of you. Loser!

She turned her phone off. When she tried to delete the posts and block the user they came back with different names. Becky thought it must be a hacker. Kay was sending messages to the sites telling them what was happening but they didn’t reply.

Becky was waiting for her at the bus stop. 'Hi, Kay, are you alright? You look terrible!' 'No, there were more of those stupid messages. I’m starting to go mad. Do you think I should go to the police?' 'Well, you could try,' said Becky. 'But I heard they won’t do anything. And besides, he’s probably using anon.com. Hackers use that site to hide their identity so the police can’t find them. Anyway, I wanted to tell you, I think I know who it is ...' Just then the bus arrived.

There were lots of kids from school on the bus. Kay felt they were all looking at her. Julie McGann was whispering to her friend. They started laughing. Kay and Becky sat down. 'Who is it?” asked Kay. “Shh! He’s sitting at the back. Don’t look!' Kay looked. Ollie Jones was sitting on the back seat, looking at his phone. 'But why?' asked Kay. 'Well, you did just finish with him, didn’t you?' said Becky. 'What? We weren’t going out,' said Kay. 'And I don’t even like him.' 'Yeah, well I heard he really liked you.'

That day at school was terrible. When she didn’t have classes with Becky no one talked to her or sat next to her. She kept getting messages.

anookins2014: What happened to your face?

pixiestar: You make me sick.

bellatricks17: Everyone hates you!

By lunchtime Kay was really upset. She hid in the art room. She couldn’t stop crying. Mrs Gibson found her there at the end of lunch break and Kay told her everything. She offered to go to the police with Kay. She said they were better at finding cyberbullies now. The bell rang. It was time for class.

Kay had IT next. Her class was already in the computer room, but the teacher wasn’t there yet. She wanted to talk to Becky but she was in the top group for computers. Everyone went quiet when she came in. There was only one computer left. She sat down at it and moved the mouse. She looked at the screen. It was a website called hatekay.com. There were photos of Kay, but changed to look ugly or disgusting. There was one of Kay that looked like a zombie. Her address, phone number and emails were there for everyone to see and there was a message at the top of the page:

'Like this page if you hate Kay Granger.'

There were more than 100 likes. Her phone beeped.

unknown number: I’m watching you.

Kay ran from the room and didn’t stop running until she got home. She didn’t go back to school that week. She kept her phone and computer switched off. Becky called a few times but Kay didn’t want to see anyone. On Monday Mrs Gibson phoned. The police thought they knew who the bully was. Kay decided to go and tell Becky.

Becky was in her bedroom doing homework on her computer. She looked surprised to see Kay. They talked for a while, but Kay got the feeling Becky didn’t want her there. Then there was a knock at the door. It was Becky’s mum. She looked very worried. 'Becky, can you come downstairs now?' Kay started to get up too. 'Could you wait here, please, Kay?' Becky’s mum smiled nervously at Kay. What was happening?

Kay waited, but Becky didn’t come back. Then her computer started beeping. She was getting messages. Kay couldn’t stop herself. She pressed a key. She couldn’t believe what she saw. There were photos of Ollie Jones. Some of them had kisses around them. There was one of Becky and Ollie. It looked like a selfie. There was a message at the bottom of the screen. Kay clicked on it and a webpage opened up. It was anon.com. Just then the door opened. It was Becky’s mum. She looked very upset. There was someone standing behind her. 'Kay, this policewoman would like to talk to you.'

I was bullied at school and i try sports like ninja ranger.
It helps me alot . It makes me belive my self and get sure about im so strong.......
Another sports like karate or kong fou
Are really good.
:) :)

Hey readers,
In this story it was about a girl named Kay and she went to school. She got really strange messages on her phone. For example: Loser! Becky is her only friend, because she lost all her other friends. Kay wanted to talk to the police, but Becky said that this wasn’t a great idea. But then the classmates presented Kay a website with ugly photos from her. She was crying and a teacher asked what’s wrong. Kay told the teacher the story and he went to the police. When Kay was at Becky’s home she saw on Becky’s computer that Becky made the website.
I’m very angry now. That’s so unfair from Becky, because Kay thought that she was a real friend, but she is a bad girl. Why did she say that she liked Kay and made a website about ugly pictures from her? I don’t understand that. And it’s right that the teacher went to the police, because that’s not okay.
However I thought the text was interesting, because it shows you shouldn’t trust everybody who said he or she liked you.
Bye, Melissa

Hello
My name is Denise and I want to tell you today about the text “Bully“. The text act from a teenager named Kay. She became every time some bad messages like “Nobody likes you“ or “You’re so ugly!“ from people, but she don’t know who this is. Kay only have one friend, Becky. Kay’s teacher went to the police but in the end oft he text you will realize that you don’t should trust your “real friends“.
I find the text very interesting, because it shows you, that it is better, if you sometimes shouldn’t hear of your heart rather of your mind!
Bye, Denise!

Hey guys,
in my opinion I think that this is a pretty great text and it´s very comprehensible, even if your English is not the best (like mine). I think the story was very realistic, I mean that could happen to everyone in real life. The best thing was the shocking ending of the Story. I felt so bad for kay, but otherwise now she knows who the bully is and the trouble has an end. I can recommend this short story to every one who´s interested in seriously topics. Especially bullying is a very tough problem for the most teenagers in our time.

I´ve read the text and I think bullying is bad its schocked me every time. Nobody should know how it feels when you get bullied, because you think you are alone and no one can help you. But the best way to find help is to talk with the liaison teacher or to go with your parents or with friends to the police. Its sad that other people have the need to bully their fellows I think they need attention or are jealous of the person , don´t be scared of the person who bullying you.

I simply think that a bully happens when one finds an outlet to relieve stress for his/her discontent and anger. It usually happens in an insidious way. Some bullies consider the victim as just like their garbage box to throw away their negative feelings as a result of pretending to be nice to other people who are more important. I knew some bullies in the past in my classroom, they absolutely had commonality of having two faces.

So I'd like to encourage the victim to have courage to quite your role as a garbage box. There will never be anything new. Find your new role with people who are more important to you. Look at the star in the sky, think about our globe, it's subject to the influence of the nearest star. It's a low of physics and we are living in the stars.
*･ﾟﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*ﾟ:*:✼✿(ღ✪ｖ✪)｡ﾟ:*:✼.｡✿.｡

I´ve just read the text and I think it's very bad to bully other children.
The bulliers don't know how it is when you feel bad or depressed.
The best way to get out of that is to go to the police and tell them everything.
Nobody should bully other children!!

Hi Miki23, I'm sorry to hear you have experienced bullying and thank you for sharing your experience - that's exactly the right thing to do. You are obviously a fantastic friend and it's great that you are there for your best friend. If your teachers were not helpful can you talk to a parent or another adult you trust? It's really important to try to find an adult who can help you stop the bullies. Good luck and best wishes, Joanna (LearnEnglish Teens team)

Three friends of mine also got bullied at school and all of them took diffrent ways to get ride of it.
One changed to another class and for one it tooks many years to do something against the bully and talk to other people about it, but all of them are fine again and thats the main point.
My only advice is that you should talk to someone who can help you and you should try to stay strong, stay happy there will be always people who don´t like you and who just try to show there strengh.
The last thing you should do is bullying someone else, because it is just idiotic.

Hi panda47, Thanks for sharing your experiences on this topic. I'm sure your positive message will help other people who face similar situations. You're completely right - it's really important to talk to someone about the problem and get help. There is no need to suffer bullying in silence and bullies don't deserve our protection. Be strong and talk about it! Thanks for writing :) Best wishes, Joanna (LearnEnglish Teens team)